Friday, December 30, 2016

Obama Perpetrating Malevolent Mischief on USA as the Door Slams Him on His Lazy Ass

President Obama has taken a flurry of unilateral actions in the waning days of his tenure that appear designed to box in President-elect Donald Trump.

Obama's decision Thursday to sanction Russian entities for election-related hacking is just the latest obstacle he has placed in Trump's way.

Day before the sanctions were unveiled, the Obama administration allowed the U.N. Security Council to condemn Israeli settlement activity — something that could have an indelible impact on the Israel-Palestinian conflict.

Obama has also permanently banned oil and gas drilling large swaths of the Atlantic and Arctic oceans, closed off 1.6 million acres of Western land to development and scrapped the last vestiges of a registration system used largely on Muslim immigrants.

Those actions, as well as Obama’s claim he could have won a third term, seem to have irked Trump and his associates as the transition period enters its final weeks.

Trump on Wednesday morning went on the attack against Obama.

“Doing my best to disregard the many inflammatory President O statements and roadblocks,” he tweeted. “Thought it was going to be a smooth transition - NOT!”

Later in the day, Trump spoke on the phone with Obama and turned down the temperature on the spat, telling reporters roughly six hours after his initial comments the transition is going “very, very smoothly.”

Yet it’s clearly not lost on Trump or his team that the president is using his power in aggressive ways.

Incoming White House press secretary Sean Spicer on Thursday said Obama’s actions could hamper his successor, even as he praised the president’s team for being “very helpful” with the logistical aspects of the transition.

“Both the regulatory stuff, the executive orders that are on the way out … that [is] something that I believe, you know, makes it a little bit tougher in terms of the transition on the policy side,” Spicer told conservative talk radio host Hugh Hewitt.

It’s unclear how many of Obama’s late actions Trump will able to reverse upon taking office.

Should Trump seek to scrap the sanctions on Russia next year, it could trigger a fight with congressional Republicans, who mostly praised the retaliatory steps Thursday even as they lambasted the Obama administration’s foreign policy.

Senior administration officials argued that any effort to roll back the sanctions would be “inadvisable” because they apply to Russian intelligence agencies working against America’s national interest.

“Hypothetically, you could reverse those sanctions,” one official told reporters. “But it wouldn’t make a lot of sense.”

The actions against Russia included booting 35 officials from the United States and closing down two compounds that were suspected of being used by Russian intelligence.

Trump has repeatedly cast doubt on claims of Russian election interference, and has said the U.S. should try and “get along” with the country and seek to fight Islamic terrorists.

Yet his response to the sanctions Thursday was muted. While he called for the country to “move on” from the controversy in a statement, he also suggested he’s willing to hear out the intelligence officials who say Russia targeted the U.S.

“It's time for our country to move on to bigger and better things. Nevertheless, in the interest of our country and its great people, I will meet with leaders of the intelligence community next week in order to be updated on the facts of this situation."

The U.N. vote on Israeli settlements is another late move by Obama that complicates Trump’s policy goals.

Trump has vowed to break with past administrations on Israeli settlement activity and move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem. Those moves would align the U.S. closer with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

But even if Trump follows through on changing U.S. policy toward Israel, it’s unlikely he will be able to repeal the U.N. resolution condemning Israeli settlements.

To do so, he would need to convince nine members of the Security Council — and the four other members with veto power, China, France, Russia and the United Kingdom — to back a measure scrapping the resolution.

The settlement resolution passed the council 14-0, with the U.S. abstaining.

While the resolution has no direct, practical effect on current settlement activity, it could make peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians more difficult in the future.

The Palestinians could use it as leverage in negotiating land swaps and the final status of holy sites in East Jerusalem, which the resolution refers to as occupied Palestinian territory.

Undoing Obama’s national monument designations — the latest protecting two massive areas in the American West — could prove a heavy lift as well, likely requiring a prolonged legal battle.

No president has ever reversed a predecessor’s actions to create a monument under the Antiquities Act.

The Obama administration and environmental groups argue it can’t legally be done, though some Republican lawmakers argue otherwise.

“In terms of whether it can be overturned, no,” said Christie Goldfuss, managing director of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. “The Antiquities Act gives the president the authority to create monuments, but does not provide explicit authority to undo them.”

Meanwhile, by dismantling the dormant National Security Entry-Exit Registration System, Obama could slow any possible effort Trump makes to set up a registry for Muslims in the U.S. The system could have served as a foundation for a new Trump program.

But Trump has signaled he plans to forge ahead with controversial counterterrorism efforts, including his proposal to ban immigration from countries with ties to Islamic extremism.

“You've known my plans all along and I’ve been proven to be right, 100 percent correct,” Trump said last week in response to a string of attacks in Europe.

80 comments:

Obama is creating chaos and destruction in high order before leaving office. He is TRYING to bring down America as much as possible in his last gasp.

From pardons to dictates.

But I think Obama doesn't understand the big picture.

He and his progressive fools have literally turned the Democrat party into a regional party. His actions have set up the book being closed on the UN and it's democracy of thugs. His actions or lack of actions have made those nations we call allies to understand they need to do ACTIONS with or without America's support.

Day before the sanctions were unveiled, the Obama administration allowed the U.N. Security Council to condemn Israeli settlement activity — something that could have an indelible impact on the Israel-Palestinian conflict.

:o)

Twaddle.

The only people that can effect the actual 'negotiations' on a two-state solution are the players involved. The most the US can do is arrange the chairs at the conference table. If they could do more, they would have done it almost 50 years ago.

The claim that the US stuck it to Israel is absurd. Everyone involved is responsible for their own actions or inaction and will enjoy the benefits or pain of it. If anyone stuck it to Israel, it was Israel.

On both sides, the Palestinians and Israel, there has been a failure of leadership. On the whole, neither side has been willing to take the risks necessary to get an agreement. They fear the political repercussions within their own constituencies of any compromise on key issues.

To argue that any other country will effect the final decision is just plain silly. It's a fruitless effort and a waste of time. IMO, the two-state solution is dead. In the long run, a one-state solution will be a disaster for both sides.

Obama has also permanently banned oil and gas drilling large swaths of the Atlantic and Arctic oceans, closed off 1.6 million acres of Western land to development and scrapped the last vestiges of a registration system used largely on Muslim immigrants.

The Patriot Act was a response to the fear of a frightened people and the government's natural impulse not waste any opportunity they are given to control.

The National Security Entry-Exit Registration System (NSEERS) or INS Special Registration[1] was a system for registering certain non-citizens within the United States, initiated in September 2002 as part of the War on Terrorism. Portions were suspended as of April 27, 2011, and the entirety of the regulation was deleted on December 22, 2016.[2]

Should Trump seek to scrap the sanctions on Russia next year, it could trigger a fight with congressional Republicans, who mostly praised the retaliatory steps Thursday even as they lambasted the Obama administration’s foreign policy.

The new sanctions were largely a purely political decision made more for domestic consumption, and likely meaningless. I think Trump probably knows this. As with most political propaganda it was fairly hypocritical. The sanctions were against a couple Russian intelligence agencies and some individuals. They won't affect the Russian economy or its people.

The 35 Russian diplomats who were kicked out, if they were spies and I suspect they probably were, they will simply be replaced by 35 new spies. SOP.

IMO, Obama had do do something trying to save face after all along saying that the Russians had tried to influence the election in favor of Trump. The move was predictable and telegraphed.

I think all the Dems have given up on the meme that the 'hacking' was a reason Hillary lost.

As for the sanctions themselves, they are largely ineffective, more show than substance. The Russians understand this. They will respond shortly. It's how the game is played. The only ones who will be influenced by them are those they were meant for, the sheeple.

Three Republican senators are working with Democrats to shield about 750,000 young undocumented immigrants from deportation if Trump cancels a 2012 order from President Barack Obama that let them stay in the U.S.

Lawmakers want to “ensure that children who were brought here by their parents, through no fault of their own, are able to stay and finish their education and continue to contribute to society,” said Republican Senator Jeff Flake of Arizona. Republicans Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska are joining him on a measure drafted by the No. 2 Democratic leader, Dick Durbin of Illinois, that will be introduced after the new Congress convenes Jan. 3.

Trump’s campaign was largely powered by his get-tough stance on immigration. A Pew Research Center poll in August found that 79 percent of Trump voters want a border wall, compared with 38 percent of all registered voters.

But among lawmakers in Congress, the desire to build a wall along the entire 1,933-mile border with Mexico has evaporated. Republicans in both chambers instead support more fencing, border patrol agents, drones and other resources to curb illegal entry. House Homeland Security Chairman Michael McCaul said he’ll offer a bill with some of those steps in January.

Kinda graphic, but no real big thing, according to Quirk, so who am I to say otherwise?

Silly, little man. You show you haven't a clue.

I put up a couple sentences (paragraphs?) on very specific subjects and you turn it into a three volume opus on the clash of civilizations. Your comment above...

Quirk calls for US to join the EU.

Borders are so yesterday.

is just plain stupid. It ignores the many posts I've put up denigrating the EU for is border and immigration policies.

But that part wouldn't fit with you silly little meme so you ignore it. Or, perhaps you just forgot it. You are getting up there, old timer.

This is all SOP with you and your bros, so rapped up in your partisan agendas you wouldn't know an objective thought if it smacked you in the face. You are like all the other partisan yokels out there on the right and left fringes. Why think when you can just emote?

He ran as an outsider and doing things differently and not status quo. I will give him the benefit of the doubt until he does otherwise, and then I will condemn him like you already have. If I remember correctly, you voted for status quo, so I can understand why you want him to fail and call him names. Gee willickers and holy Toledo.

I couldn't vote for Trump based on a number of his positions (though I did agree with the majority).

I couldn't vote for the libertarian. He was nutx and at times seemed to be talking in tongues.

I voted for the Green Party candidate on principle even knowing that she didn't have a chance. My vote was based on the facts that I liked her foreign policy and thought she would never get her domestic policies through Congress anyway. It was only after the fact that I saw she was the same as all the others. I won't make that mistake again.

In the end, I should have voted for the No-Tax Party candidate as I did in the previous three elections.

...so I can understand why you want him to fail and call him names.

Why in the world would any sane American wish for Trump to fail as president? Am I skeptical he will succeed? Yes. We've been over the reasons many times. Do I wish him to fail? Ridiculous.

She was an outsider never having held elected office before. I liked her views on foreign policy, military spending, campaign-finance reform, and the two-party system. I could forgive many her other far left views because in my view even if bt sone fluke she made it to the Oval Office, she would never get her proposals through Congress.

What's she bitching about ? There were massive votes for her in the outer Detroit area, a pattern poll watchers said they had never seen the like of before, concentrated around the area know as 'Ye Olde Mafia Barber Shoppe District.'

December 30, 2016Luther and anti-Semitism, 500 years laterBy Herbert London

When one discusses Martin Luther, there is little doubt he was a visionary, a caustic force in history that changed the world of Christendom. He was also an anti-Semite, albeit as a young man he spoke out about the oppression of Jews in Europe believing they could be candidates for conversion to Christianity. When this vision proved unsuccessful, Luther turned on the Jews urging persecution and degradation.

In his book On the Jews and Their Lies, he asks plaintively, "What shall we Christians do with this rejected and condemned people, the Jews?" He answers this question with a program of destruction: "Set fire to the synagogues; raze the houses; remove the prayer books; forbid rabbinic instruction; forbid commercial activity; prohibit usury; take their silver and gold and put "a flail, an ax, a hole, a spade, a distaff or a spindle into the hands of young strong Jews and Jewesses[.]"

Luther evolved into this hateful position. In 1519, he argued against hatred of Jews noting, "What Jew would consent to enter our ranks when he sees the cruelty and enmity we wreak on them – that in our behavior towards them we less resemble Christians than beasts." It was Luther's fond hope that Jews would hear the gospel and be moved to conversion. He maintained that Jews "are blood relatives, cousins and brothers of our Lord."

However, these "blood relatives" obstinately refused to oblige. When in 1536, the elector of Saxony, John Fredrick, prohibited Jews from inhabiting his state, engaging in business, or passing through his realm, Jewish leaders requested Luther's assistance in obtaining an audience with the prince. Luther refused. He said, "I would willingly do my best for your people, but I will not contribute to your obstinacy by my own kind actions. You must find another intermediary with my good lord." Some historians have called this episode the decisive turning point in Luther's stance – from friendliness to hostility.

What this anti-Semitism suggests is that even a great man haunted by his relationship with God and eager to address the excesses of indulgences had his flaws. Luther was a rebel whose actions challenged the Church with his submission of Ninety-Five Theses that defied Church doctrine. Most significantly, he fractured Catholicism, leading inevitably to half of Europe and a significant portion of the globe embracing his interpretation of the New Testament.

The irony of Luther's anti-Semitism is that the Protestant Ethic, which instills the notion of hard work and accomplishment as signs of salvation, is compatible with the cultural Jewish desire for secular success and theological recognition. It is not merely a coincidence that Jews have prospered in Protestant-dominated nations. The "condemned Jews" of Luther’s past have become the symbol of Protestantism's success.

Today, American Evangelicals embrace Jews as their brothers. In fact, the ties between Israel and Protestant nations have never been closer. My guess is, if Luther could envision what his ideas have wrought, he would evolve into a pro-Jewish position.

HOUSING UNITS AND DOUBLE STANDARDSWhere is Obama’s outrage about the Palestinians building 15,000 illegal housing units?December 30, 2016 Joseph Puder 64Share to FacebookShare to TwitterShare to More80Share to Print

The Obama Administrations unprecedented vote to abstain rather than cast the traditional veto on the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) Resolution 2334, was, in the words of Professor Alan Dershowitz, “nasty” and referring to Obama as pulling a “bait and switch.” In a Fox-News interview, Dershowitz related that President Obama called him to ask for his support. Obama, Dershowitz recalled, said, “I will always have Israel’s back.” Dershowitz added, he indeed “stabbed” Israel in the back. The Obama administration rejection of the traditional U.S. policy toward Israel has to do with a personal vendetta against Israel’s Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu, and anger over the election of Donald Trump as president. There is moreover, a double-standard vis-à-vis housing in the territories.

UNSC Resolution 2334 is a non-binding document and deals with Israeli settlements in “Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem.” The resolution states that Israel’s settlement activity constitutes “flagrant violation” of International law that has “no legal validity,” and demands that Israel stop such activity and fulfill its obligation as an “occupying power” under the Fourth Geneva Convention.

The December 23, 2016 UNSC resolution obfuscates history and reality. It is reminiscent of the notorious 1975 UN Resolution that equated Zionism (Israel national liberation movement) with racism, this time with the Obama administration’s collusion, albeit, without naming it Zionism. The very term “Palestinian territories occupied since 1967,” is outrageously false. Israel did not take “Palestinian territory in 1967, it took Jordanian territory, which the Jordanian Arab Legion illegally occupied in 1948. Israel won Judea and Samaria (West Bank) in a defensive war, after being attacked by Jordan. There was never a state of Palestine, nor Palestinian territories. What might have been “Palestinian territories” was rejected by Arab-Palestinians in 1947 during the UN vote on the Partition of (British) Mandatory Palestine. The Palestinian-Arabs, unlike Jewish-Palestinians, rejected the partition, choosing instead to annihilate the nascent Jewish state.

Ambassador Alan Baker, an Israeli expert on International law, former Israeli ambassador to Canada, and director of The Institute for Contemporary Affairs at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, pointed out that the Palestinian claim that “settlements are a violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilians (1949) is false. But both the text of that convention, and the post-World War II circumstances under which it was drafted, clearly indicate that it was never intended to refer to situations like Israel’s settlements. According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, Article 49 relates to situations where populations are coerced into being transferred. There is nothing to link such circumstances to Israel’s settlement policy.

During the negotiations on the 1998 Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, Arab states initiated an addition to the text in order to render it applicable to Israel’s settlement policy. This was indicative of the international community’s acknowledgment that the original 1949 Geneva Convention language was simply not relevant to Israel’s settlements.

The continued reliance by the international community on the Geneva Convention as the basis for determining the illegality of Israel’s settlements fails to take into account the unique nature of the history, legal framework, and negotiating circumstances regarding the West Bank.

A special regime between Israel and the Palestinians is set out in a series of agreements negotiated between 1993 and 1999 that are still valid – that govern all issues between them, settlements included. In this framework there is no specific provision restricting planning, zoning, and continued construction by either party. The Palestinians cannot now invoke the Geneva Convention regime in order to bypass previous internationally acknowledged agreements.”

Naturally, nothing has been said by the Obama administration about the illegal Arab-Palestinian construction of settlements in the West Bank and Jerusalem. Bassam Tawil, a Gatestone Institute scholar based in the Middle East pointed out that, “Apparently, settlements are only a ‘major obstacle to peace’ when they are constructed by Jews. The EU and some Islamic governments and organizations are paying for the construction of illegal Palestinian settlements, while demanding that Israel halt building new homes for Jewish families in Jerusalem neighborhoods or existing settlements in the West Bank. The hypocrisy and raw malice of the EU and the rest of the international community toward the issue of Israeli settlements is blindingly transparent. Yet we are also witnessing the hypocrisy of many in the Western mainstream media, who see with their own eyes the Palestinian settlements rising on every side of Jerusalem, but choose to report only about Jewish building.”

Tawil rhetorically asked “Who is behind the unprecedented wave of illegal construction? According to Arab residents of Jerusalem, many of the ‘contractors’ are actually land-thieves and thugs who lay their hands on private Palestinian-owned land or on lands whose owners are living abroad. But they also point out that the EU, the PLO and some Arab and Islamic governments are funding the project. ‘They spot an empty plot of land and quickly move in to seize control over it,’ said a resident whose land was confiscated by the illegal contractors.”

Arab-Palestinian construction is not only illegal but unsafe as well. While the construction of Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria has long been carried out with proper licenses, and within the framework of the law, the Arab-Palestinian construction does not begin to meet even the minimum standards required by engineers, architects, and housing planners. The Palestinian Authority’s (PA) goal is to create irreversible facts on the ground. Moreover, half the apartments built remain empty, in spite of the ludicrous price tag of $25,000 - $50,000 per unit, when comparable Jewish housing is $250,000 and up. The answer is, of course, the EU funding. These homes have been built without permits, corroborated by the fact that unauthorized or illegal building by Palestinians is an ongoing problem in Area C, solely under Israeli control.

It is the same EU countries who voted to declare the Western Wall of Solomon’s Temple , and the Jewish Quarter in Jerusalem as “Palestinian territory” at last Friday’s vote (December 23, 2016), funded Palestinian housing, while repeatedly condemning Israeli construction due to family enlargement. Yet, in the Oslo Accords framework there is no specific provision restricting planning, zoning, and continued construction by either party in Judea and Samaria. The difference is that Jewish construction is done lawfully, legally, and safe, while the Palestinian construction is unlawful, unsafe, and serves one purpose only - to avoid negotiating with Israel a peaceful disposition of the territories called Judea and Samaria.

The UN, Britain and the Obama administration expressed outrage last October at Israel’s plan to construct 300 new homes in Judea and Samaria, but no such outrage at the genocide in Syria, or the building of 15,000 illegal Palestinian housing units in areas surrounding Jerusalem as part of a plan to encircle the city. The Obama administrations deliberate abstention in last Friday’s vote, which was akin to voting “yes” for this notoriously anti-Israel biased resolution, is inimical to Israeli-Palestinian peace, and will serve to further encourage the PA to incite against the Jewish state, while avoiding a negotiated settlement with Israel. It also exposes the double-standard used by the Obama administration in dealing with Israel.

In her New Year’s speech, Chancellor Angela Merkel affirmed that her government will win the fight against terrorism with compassion and denied that her open-door mass migration policy, which directly brought terrorists to Germany, was wrong.In the federal chancellor’s New Year address to Germany, Merkel asserted that the terror attacks committed by Islamist migrants in Würzburg, Ansbach, and recently at a Christmas market in Berlin were not attacks on Western civilisation but an attack on ‘refugees’ and Germany’s willkommenskultur (‘welcome culture’).

She stated terrorists “mock [the willingness of Germany to help] with their deeds [acts of terrorism], like they mock those who really need and deserve our protection.”

Adding that it is “particularly bitter and repulsive” when terrorist attacks are committed by migrants, Merkel pushed back against criticism of her unwavering commitment to mass migration, saying that Germany will fight the “hatred” of terrorism with “humanity” and “unity.”

“With the images of bombed-out Aleppo in Syria, it is important to remember once again how important and correct it was that our country has helped in the past year those who need our protection,” she said.

Acknowledging that Islamic terrorism is the biggest test for Germany, Merkel hinted at new security measures for the year ahead – but not at changes to her open-door mass migration policies.

The Big Bang Theory’ Threatens to Dethrone Sunday Night Football as TV’s Most Watched Show

josetoyou • 3 minutes ago

Only suckers support "professional" athletics, and most of the overpaid players would be in jail or on welfare was it not for the sport...

rahimi hash • 4 minutes ago

I can not watch Feets-ball, or Bakka-ball, because it's always some colored guy, running around with a ball, like it's a big accomplishment. On the other hand, white males are fascinated, by watching a big, black, 'Mandingo,' running around with a feetsball, and imagining said Mandingo, sharing a bed with his lover.

mike newkirk • 2 hours ago

I guess the NFL's version of "fun with flags" is not as popular.

Tad Gnarley mike newkirk • an hour ago

Millionaires playing for billionaires telling me how I should think about anything other than the sports they are paid to play is a big deflator.

Two teens have been arrested for robbing a nine-year-old’s lemonade stand. They took all the money that nine-year-old Lucas made which amounted to $13.41 and then the two robbers stole his iPod.

HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY, Fla. (WFLA) – Two Lutz teenagers were arrested Wednesday after deputies say they robbed two 9-year-old children who were operating a lemonade stand.

Lucas, age 9, just wanted to make some money with a simple lemonade stand inside his apartment complex.

“My mom was making limeonade with limes and then I thought of making a lemonade stand,” said Lucas…

…Then a bad thing happened. Lucas and the other children were robbed.

“I did pretty well. I made $13.41 and then I got robbed by two people. They took all the money and then they took my iPod,” said Lucas…

…Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office deputies responded and arrested two Lutz teens. A 16-year-old girl was charged with misdemeanor battery and misdemeanor petit theft. 19-year-old Deante Small was charged with felony robbery by sudden snatching.

Deputies were not able to recover the cash or the iPod.

“I didn’t know they took the iPod, so I didn’t know and then once I found out, I was really sad,” said Lucas.

Still, the theft did not stop him. One day later he was back with his friends selling lemonade.

Magnificent Ronald and the Founding Fathers of al Qaeda

“These gentlemen are the moral equivalents of America’s founding fathers.” — Ronald Reagan while introducing the Mujahideen leaders to media on the White house lawns (1985). During Reagan’s 8 years in power, the CIA secretly sent billions of dollars of military aid to the mujahedeen in Afghanistan in a US-supported jihad against the Soviet Union. We repeated the insanity with ISIS against Syria.